


Waking Hours

by captainbluebear



Series: Some Days [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Conversations from Beyond the Grave, F/M, Family, Gen, Ghost Tonks (sorta), alternative universe, parallel worlds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-06-04 20:24:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6674305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainbluebear/pseuds/captainbluebear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His wife is dead and all Remus wants to do is sleep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waking Hours

**Author's Note:**

> This is a companion piece for Some Days set in the world where Remus lives. The original idea behind Some Days was to explore how Remus and Tonks would deal with single parenthood, but that got a bit lost, so I decided to write this. I am also planning a similar fic for Tonks

Remus used to hate sleeping. He would toss and turn in his bedroom, and then later in the Gryffindor boys’ dormitory, plagued by nightmares. Sometimes he would relive the night he had been bitten, or dream about accidentally biting one of his friends and being torn apart by a baying mob. Strangely enough, most of his nightmares weren’t actually werewolf related. More often he dreamed of drowning, being trapped beneath an ice floe or a ship, desperately trying to find a way to the surface before he ran out of oxygen.

He grew out of the drowning nightmare, eventually, though the thought of them still made him shudder.

During the war, Remus hated to sleep because it made him vulnerable. There were enemies everywhere; a different friend of his was killed every week. The work he was undergoing for the order was dangerous; he could get torn apart any moment and he knew it. He needed to be alert.

Being part of the war made Remus feel good. It gave him a purpose. He couldn’t have a job or a family or a normal life, but he could help save the wizarding world. He hated to give in to sleep, to take a break from the one thing that gave his life meaning.

He slept a lot, after James and Lily died.

The war was over. He was useless now and he had nothing to move on to. Engaging in the world, living life, would cause nothing but pain. All it did was remind him of the people he had lost. So he wallowed, in the safety of unconsciousness and intoxication. He thought, wrongly, that the grief wouldn’t get him there.

Now Remus had another reason to prefer sleep to waking. When he was asleep, Remus dreamt of her.

She came and sat with him, in a bar or the garden or wherever the dream was set. She told him old stories from her school days and made rude jokes and passed on gossip from her mother. She held his hand and looked him in the eyes, as if to tell him _this is okay._ She asked about Teddy and Remus told her, about Teddy’s first laugh, first words, first steps.

She seemed so real, so solid, it was impossible to feel she was a dream. It felt as if Tonks was still out there, somewhere, trapped away from him, and dreams were the only place she could visit him.  

It was ridiculous, Remus knew. Tonks was dead and gone. She had moved on, to a world so far beyond this one he could never reach it while living. 

Tonks was just an illusion. A figment of his imagination that he shouldn’t indulge. He needed to stay in the living world, the waking world, with his son.

Teddy never seemed to sleep. He was always crying or moaning or gurgling. He always needed to be picked up or fed or changed. Remus was sure Teddy only slept soundly while he wasn’t looking.

Andromeda had moved in, to help with Teddy, and, Remus suspected, to escape the haunting quiet of her home. Often, Remus would go to Teddy and Andromeda would swoop in at the last moment to fuss over him. Remus understood that she was lonely, that her grandson was the last of her family and she needed him, possibly more than he needed her. But still, Remus couldn’t help but feel that he wasn’t trusted. There was a spark of hostility there, between him and Andromeda. He was the man who stole her daughter, he was the werewolf that ruined her standing in society and put her safety at risk.

He wondered if Andromeda blamed him for Tonks’ death. It would be foolish if she did. Tonks’ decisions were entirely her own, always.

It was nice though, that Andromeda insisted on taking over with Teddy on occasion. It gave him more time to sleep.

***

He dreamt of her the night before the funeral. She kept on asking him not to put her in the ground. “I’m scared, it’s stupid I know. But I’m scared of the dark now.” He told her, over and over, that she was being cremated, as per her mother’s request, but she didn’t hear him. Tonks seemed more distant, like he was losing hold of her. Maybe that was a good thing, he thought, thinking of his son.

There was a mass funeral for the people killed at Hogwarts on the last day of the war. Remus had attended and watched as former students of his were lowered into the ground. It felt obscene to be there, his heart still beating, while Colin Creevey was a still, empty shell in his coffin.

Remus and Andromeda immediately agreed that they did not want Tonks buried with the other victims of the war. They both wanted something individual, different for her.

Remus ordered the flowers, though Andromeda paid for them. Tulips and roses in every colour – every conceivable shade of pink, purple, yellow, red and peach. There were even blue roses – specially enchanted, unique, and perfect for Tonks. There was a riot of colour, cascading over Tonks’ coffin so every bit of brown wood was obscured. She would have thought it a bit soppy, maybe, but she would have loved the colour all the same. It was her.

At the end of service the coffin slid away from view, going behind a curtain to be incinerated, flowers and all. Every colour of flower, burned to ash, until Tonks was one with the roses and the tulips. Again, soppy, but Remus couldn’t help himself.

The service was paused twice so that Remus could take a crying Teddy outside to feed and change. Andromeda insisted that the service stop until Remus returned, so the guests were forced to either sit in silence or attempt awkward small talk with each other. Remus felt grateful to Andromeda; it was a concession from her, he knew, an acknowledgement that at the time she died, Remus was the second most important person in Tonks’ life, behind only Teddy.

When Remus got home from the funeral, he immediately went to his bed and collapsed there, dress robes still on. Teddy slept in the crib beside his bed.

***

After Harry was born, James joked that parenthood had turned him into a zombie. Remus finally understood what he had meant, though he could never be entirely that it was parenthood and not grief that had transformed him. A combination of the two, he supposed.

He did his best, he held Teddy and fed Teddy and bathed him, and to be truthful being with Teddy was the only time when he could feel a glimpse of happiness. But the zombification had occurred, and his existence seemed to blur. He was trapped in a grey cloud, and if only Tonks was there she might cut through it and reach him, bring him out of the misery the way she always managed to when she was alive.

She lifted him out of his pain and glumness. She made him laugh. She loved him even though he was convinced down to his very core that he was unloveable. She fought for him, fierce and wild and she wouldn’t let him go, wouldn’t let him fall through the cracks of his own self-hatred.

She made it okay to be himself. No, she made it better than okay. She made it wonderful to be Remus Lupin, because Remus was loved, totally and utterly, by Nymphadora Tonks.

And now she was gone. She wouldn’t fight for him anymore.

He would have to fight for himself, and for his son.

***

Teddy grew up. Thank god, Teddy grew up. He became clever, and mischievous and curious about anything that Remus could tell him. He loved to hear about the magical creatures Remus had met in his travels or watch Remus produce things with his wand – flowers or fireworks or a swarm of bees that burst like bubbles when Teddy touched them – and listened to Remus explain the mechanics of the magic behind them. He loved to be read to, every day, non-fiction books especially, and Remus ran through every children’s spell book or wizarding history or Big Book Of Potions For Boys in the local magical library. He also read muggle books, including ones his mother read to him as a child. So, Teddy learned all about the Vikings and dinosaurs and tectonic plates deep within the earth.

Reading to Teddy was reason enough to stay awake. He still missed Tonks with a fire that burned in him every day, threatening to choke him to death with smoke, but then Teddy would laugh or ask a clever question or want to play a game and Remus could be okay again.

That was part of why it scared him so much, when Teddy had his turns. They started off as just moments, tiny instances of blinking confusion. He would be talking to Teddy, explaining something, and then suddenly Teddy would stop following. There would be a dazed expression on his face and he would look at Remus as though he was surprised that he was there.

Sometimes, especially when he was younger, Teddy would get violent after his turns. He would start sobbing and screaming and when Remus tried to approach him he would get bitten and scratch. It wasn’t malicious, Remus could tell. It was more as though was he confused, lashing out in a haze. Once, after one of his tantrums, Teddy said he just felt so sad, he didn’t know what to do.

Sometimes, after Teddy had one of his turns, he would ask for his mother. Whenever this happened it felt as though ice water was flooding his veins. “No,” he would say, “It’s your Dad, I’m here.” And he would hug Teddy so tightly that Teddy would protest that Remus was squashing him.

Every night after Teddy had one of his turns, without fail, Remus would dream about Tonks. She would tell stories, about funny things Teddy had done, little jokes he made (Teddy insisted that “What’s brown and sticky?” was his own original creation, no matter what Remus said.) Remus would ask Tonks how she could possibly know these things since she was dead. She would just smile cryptically and say “I’m his parent too you know”.

***

When Teddy was eight, Minerva McGonagall came to their house and offered Remus a job. Until then, Remus had only had odd jobs and was dependent, much to his shame, on Andromeda and Harry helping out. They always said it was for Teddy, not him. They were just doing their family duty.

Minerva explained that she had stayed away for a while, since Remus had Teddy to look after and Tonks to grieve, but she could really do with him in the role, and he could commute from home.

Remus accepted instantly. Andromeda could stay at home with Teddy during the day, and Remus could be there in the evenings. It was perfect, really.

There was something dreamlike about walking back into Hogwarts after so many years. He had been so sure, when he had left his teaching job all those years ago, that he would never come back. He had accepted that the one job he had really loved was over. He came to terms with that grief.

But now he was back, in those halls again. He couldn’t help but smile as he set up his office, looked over the grounds, visited the different classrooms. Each part of the castle seemed to be filled with some warm, fuzzy memory, either from his school days or from when he last was a teacher. It seemed natural to be back here.

Except, for one particular corridor. He knew it immediately, though the castle had been extensively remodelled after the war. He recognised the fixtures on the wall, the colour of the stone and the uneven slabs on the floor. The place where she died. The place where Bellatrix Lestrange killed her. It was bizarre, to be walking through the halls of his workplace and then suddenly be thrown back to the moment his wife was a murdered. To suddenly be reminded of the final spell she cast that wasn’t quite enough, or the way she turned her head a fraction of a moment before the killing curse hit her, so she didn’t have to look Bellatrix in eye when she died, but could instead see her husband, standing close by. Close by, but not close enough to save her, Remus thought bitterly.

He tried to not let it distract him, the triggers that lay scattered across the castle. He avoided that corridor, and refused to let his eyes linger over the spot in the great hall where her body had been laid out, lying next to the fifty or so others who had been killed, resting under the stars.

Despite this, sometimes he would see Tonks around the castle, walking through the corridors, standing in the great hall, flying a broomstick over the lake during a storm. Flashes of her came to him. He always shook them off.

***

It was wonderful, to get back to teaching. Every single part of it – from making lesson plans to marking essays to running classes to even boring administrative tasks – was exhilarating. He lost himself in the rhythm of school life. He felt like he had a purpose again.

He hated that he had to take time off for his transformations, but they were common knowledge now, so at least he didn’t have to worry about his students discovering the truth.

***

Teddy kept having his turns, and Remus felt hopeless. He would come home to find a dazed, confused boy. He continued to be the curious little boy Remus had always known, in between his turns, but it seemed as though something was gradually eating him up.

Remus started to lose sleep to worry. His dreams became feverish – Tonks was there, but she was unclear, clouded in fog, and nothing she said made sense.

***

Tonks was alive. He felt sure of it. She was dead too- he had seen her die, had watched her body fall the floor of the great hall, her mouth open, her eyes hollow. She was dead, undoubtedly, but Teddy could see her and Remus could feel her. She was alive, somewhere. He didn’t know what to do, what magic might bring her to him. But he prayed and wished for her return.

He awoke from the dreams, came out of the fevers, and told himself that he had been deluded by grief.

***

Teddy was in trouble. This much was obvious. He was falling far behind in school. When Remus was teaching his class, Teddy sat at the back. Sometimes he might seem engaged, answering a question Remus gave him, then a moment later would look totally perplexed.

Remus spearheaded the special intervention. He coached Teddy, day after day, evening after evening. Teddy was making it through, just about. But there was a mystery, something wrong with Teddy that Remus couldn’t quite place.

***

It was Tonks who worked it out. They were sitting together, on a bench in the back garden of the house he lived in when he was eight. The house had been old and dilapidated even when he had lived there; the insides had surrendered to mould and tiles were falling off the roof. Now, several of the walls of the house had collapsed, exposing the decomposing interior. He could see the old sofa he used to play on and hide behind in the living, sagging and grey. It was odd, that the sofa was still there after all this time.

Tonks was swinging her legs under the bench. Her bare toes brushed lightly against the brown grass. Remus wanted to tell her to put her shoes on; there could be splinters of wood or broken glass lying around, ready to hurt her. But when he turned to say this to her she smiled at him and then spoke: “Teddy is confused”.

“Yeah, I can see that. It’s like he barely knows where he is half the time.”

“Maybe he doesn’t know.” Tonks took Remus fingers in her hands, tracing over his knuckles with the pad of her thumb. He could see her hand touching his, but all he could feel on his hand was the faintest puff of air.

“He knows me,” said Tonks. “I’m not here, but he knows me anyway.” She leaned into Remus’ shoulder and he almost felt her there. “Why do you think that could be?”

“You’re a ghost,” said Remus. Tonks shook her head.

“You know I would never choose that.”

“He used to talk about your brownies,” said Remus wistfully. “He said they were always delicious, even when you burned them and they got stuck to the pan.” He smiled. “You don’t like cooking, but you still bake him amazing brownies.”

Tonks was smiling too. “Of course, I make the best brownies. I used to put chocolate frogs on them after they came out of the oven, but Teddy got upset because their legs would melt and they would get stuck.”

“He told me about that.” Remus grimaced. “But then he said he was making it up.”

Tonks laughed. “You really think he was?”

***

Tonks was alive. Tonks was alive somewhere, out there, and she was trying to reach Remus. Tonks was alive and Teddy was with her, was seeing her.

He had had this thought in the back of his mind for a while now, but he finally understood.

He didn’t want to confront Teddy right away. He wanted to work out what was going on.

***

The day Remus died, he woke with the certain knowledge that he was going to fix this. He was going to save his son. He was going to find his wife.

When the world started spinning in the middle of a lesson his first thought was that he was about to faint. He didn’t have a second thought.

There was pain, the most intense, ungodly pain, and then he closed his eyes.

The darkness swirled around him, and he was drifting through it, riding on it like a wave.

Then he was awake, surrounded by blinding light, and she was there, her face gradually coming into focus.

He saw her lips move, but no sound seemed to come from them. Even so, he was sure what she was saying:

 “Teddy is okay.”


End file.
